A Holistic Cancer Doctor Who Works With Your Treatment, Not Around It
A cancer diagnosis narrows the world to scans, treatments, and appointments. Whole-person care widens it again, attending to your energy, nutrition, sleep, and resilience while your oncology team directs the treatment itself.
Dr. Malathi Acharya, MD, integrative cancer care at Ayur, Portola Valley
First, the Most Important Thing
Holistic cancer care at Ayur supports conventional oncology, it never replaces it. Chemotherapy, radiation, surgery, and immunotherapy remain the foundation of cancer treatment, directed by your oncologist.
What Dr. Malathi adds is the layer around that treatment: physician-led integrative cancer care that considers nutrition, sleep, stress, and overall wellbeing, coordinated with the plan your oncology team has set, so every complementary step fits safely alongside it.
Support at Every Stage
What helps is different at each point of the journey, so care is shaped to where you actually are.
When Everything Just Changed
The weeks after a diagnosis are disorienting. Alongside the decisions your oncology team is guiding, there is room for steadying the basics, sleep, nourishment, and stress, so you enter treatment as supported as possible.
Support after a new diagnosis →
Caring for the Person Going Through It
While your oncologist treats the cancer, Dr. Malathi focuses on you: nutrition that fits your treatment, gentle strategies for energy and rest, and mind-body practices that may help you carry the load, all coordinated with your existing care.
Integrative care during treatment →
After Treatment Ends, Care Continues
Finishing treatment is a milestone, and often the start of a different set of questions about energy, resilience, and long-term health. Survivorship care attends to rebuilding, steadily and realistically.
Care for cancer survivors →
Looking After the Years Ahead
For those focused on reducing risk, whether after treatment or with a family history in mind, nutrition, movement, sleep, and stress are areas where daily choices meaningfully participate in long-term health.
Prevention-focused care →What Supportive Care May Include
Depending on your situation and your treatment plan, never as a fixed program.
Every element is considered alongside your conventional treatment and discussed in the context of your oncology team’s plan.
Care Led by Dr. Malathi Acharya, MD
Dr. Malathi is a board-certified internal medicine physician and Diplomate of the American Board of Integrative Medicine, with fellowship training from the Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine and a practice that includes integrative oncology support. Her holistic approach to cancer care is grounded in 25+ years of conventional medical experience.
Board-Certified Internal Medicine · Diplomate, ABOIM · Andrew Weil Center Fellowship · Integrative Ayurvedic Medicine
About Dr. MalathiFrequently Asked Questions About Holistic Cancer Care
At Ayur, a holistic cancer doctor is a physician who provides whole-person supportive care alongside conventional oncology, considering nutrition, sleep, stress, energy, and quality of life together with the treatment plan your oncology team directs. Dr. Malathi Acharya, MD is a board-certified internist and Diplomate of the American Board of Integrative Medicine whose practice includes integrative oncology support.
No, and it should not. Conventional oncology treatment remains the foundation of cancer care. Ayur's integrative approach is designed to complement that treatment, supporting overall wellbeing while your oncologist directs the treatment itself. Dr. Malathi does not recommend using complementary approaches in place of conventional cancer treatment.
Yes. Supportive care works best when it is coordinated. Dr. Malathi considers your existing treatment plan, medications, and your oncology team's guidance when discussing any complementary approach, so recommendations fit safely alongside the care you are already receiving.
Patients seek supportive care at many points: after a new diagnosis, during active treatment, in recovery and survivorship, and when focusing on prevention and long-term health. What is appropriate differs at each stage, which is why care is individualized rather than a fixed program.
Depending on the individual and their treatment plan, it may include nutrition guidance, mind-body practices such as meditation and breathwork, sleep and energy support, gentle movement, stress management, and evidence-informed elements of Ayurveda, always considered alongside, never instead of, conventional care.
The first step is a discovery call, a short conversation about your situation, your current treatment, and whether Ayur's supportive approach is a good fit. Visits are available in person in Portola Valley and by telehealth for patients in California.
Whole-Person Support, Alongside Your Treatment
Whether you are newly diagnosed, in treatment, or rebuilding afterward, a conversation is a gentle place to start. Your oncology care stays exactly where it belongs, and you gain a physician looking after the rest of you.
Dr. Malathi Acharya, MD • Ayur Integrative Medicine • Portola Valley, California • Telehealth Available